


On the Precipice

by Fernis



Series: Such Things [1]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Alien Zer0 (Borderlands), Canon Compliant, Gen, Minor Axton/Zer0 (Borderlands), Nonbinary Zer0 (Borderlands), References to Depression, Suicidal Thoughts, they found a quiet place on sanctuary that makes them.. think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:35:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25740682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fernis/pseuds/Fernis
Summary: On the precipiceThe ideal place to thinkSo close to the edge.
Relationships: Axton/Zer0 (Borderlands)
Series: Such Things [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1867192
Comments: 3
Kudos: 18





	On the Precipice

**Author's Note:**

> The Axton/Zer0 in this is so minor, one tiny mention, but the rest in the series is full of it so no worries. This is setup.

Exploring Sanctuary was normal, for them. Zer0 had always enjoyed finding places that were untouched by others, especially in a place as crowded as this one. No one complained or questioned the assassin skulking in the alleyways or leaping over the rooftops in search of some new place to disappear.

But none of the other places in Sanctuary made them feel.. Quite like this. A room no one entered anymore, so easily accessible but not even spared a single thought. It was obvious what had happened to it- The room where Roland had been pinned those few moments before Sanctuary ripped away from the planet’s surface. Half of the building had stayed behind, leaving a place that dropped off into nothing.

The effect was.. Disorienting. Zer0 had opened the door expecting storage or rubble, yet was met with a view of the open sky and the landscape below. They couldn’t remember a time when they’d been so high up.

The thought was exhilarating. Zer0 rarely fell, and if they did it was rarer still that they’d be injured from it. But this.. A step off the edge here would leave them plummeting to the ground below; their only enemy being gravity and the mortality that they tried so, so hard to ignore in their own veins. 

They could die. Possibly the only way they could. 

The urge nearly overtook them, leading them to approach the edge and standing precariously on the ripped-away floor. It felt stable, but was it? Would it crumble away beneath them, leaving them to a gorey death at the impassive hands of fate? They had no way of knowing, and the chance thrilled them.

The pull of the room was magnetic, gaze refusing to leave the border where safety simply.. Stopped. A building, stable and safe, then the open air, so high up that it would take so, so long to reach the dirt below. Enough time to ponder, to feel fear. Slow, unlike a bullet to the head, and painless, unlike bleeding out from a wound. The only kind of death that gave you time to process it without pain, only to rip your life away in an instant.

Zer0 sat on the edge for a while, the door closed behind them to keep out any unwanted company. There was no reason for anyone to suspect they’d be in here, and no cause for a person to stumble in looking for something. This place was barren. Dedicated to the end of everything.

It filled them with an almost hollow feeling, legs dangling off the edge into the void. A mixture of so many different instincts trying to claw their way up their throat, but they were not in tune with any of them; could hardly recognize each one for what it was.

The assassin knew what they were, had made their peace with their existence long ago. Yet moments like these still crept in every now and then, making them mourn what they never had in the first place.

A mess of DNA and mechanical parts and no soul, lacking a home or ancestry. Made to kill, spliced together into the perfect weapon, only the best pieces the universe had to offer- organic or otherwise.

Moments like this made them wish they’d had a soul; could feel the torn remnants of one flickering at the edges of their being, trying to spark to life. It always suffocated, in the end.

It wouldn’t matter, if they’d died. The body would die and then they’d blink out of existence, no longer having to suffer the longing, the hole in themself.

But would it be better? 

Zer0 had found something here on Pandora that had been missing. What it was, they weren’t sure, but they could feel it. Felt it stir whenever Maya congratulated them on a good kill, whenever Gaige cackled from the gunner’s seat of a light runner, when Salvador couldn’t help but smack Zer0 on the back after a night at Moxxi’s. 

When Axton grinned at them or even the others, smile a little too much teeth but always purely sincere. 

Perhaps they didn’t know what it was- Maybe they couldn’t know because it wasn’t what they’d been made for.. But it was something. New and exciting and for once in their miserable life Zer0 could feel something that wasn’t programmed into their skull. 

Like hell they were going to give that up.

**Author's Note:**

> Zer0 refers to themself as they/them, but does not mind when others call them he/him.


End file.
